Only A Girl
by Blown
Summary: Hermione. A Kurt-Vonnegut style story written on a very persistent muse.


I whim I got yesterday when I was binge-reading HP/LV and Merlin-is-Harry stories. What if Hermione had that kick-assery instead?

This could be a full story, told in a series of one-shots.

Dedicated to all the HPLV writers out that pairing is endlessly amazing.

\- Only A Girl -

Of two things were Hermione Granger absolutely certain. One, facts were always true. It was why she loved reading and books. They had facts. Knowledge. Irrefutable pieces of wisdom that would always be there for her, and would get her through times of need. Two, she was a gryffindor. A true gryffindor that really valued courage and running headfirst into impossible situations. The difference, she thought, between her and Harry or Ron, was that she liked to be prepared. She had the facts. And she prided herself on who she was: a gryffindor, a friend, a muggleborn, and a witch.

And though the following wasn't one of the two absolutely certain things Hermione believed in, she was pretty sure she was an brilliant witch.

Which was why she was getting so frustrated that she couldn't understand wards. It was the summer of her fourth year and she had been moved to Grimmaud Palace, ready to kill someone if they made her clean _one more closet_ , and Bill had volunteered to teach her runes. He had asked her a range of questions testing her knowledge, and if the raise in his eyebrows was anything to go by, he had been impressed. He had announced that she knew all the basics ready to construct her own pentagon, which was the basis of all incredibly strong wards.

But after an hour of sqiggly drawings, lots of mental arithmatic, and detailed explainations, Hermione still couldn't do it. She cleared out a bit of space on the lined paper, and started drawing a pentagon. Then she placed runes in it.

"So if I link Ehwaz, here," She drew a line from one squiggle to another on the page, bitting her lip nervously, "To Tanvir…and then Tanvir to Ooosh, "

"Oush." Bill corrected automatically.

"Oush." Hermione repeated dutifully, sweat pouring down, "Then Jangen, which I can connect to Ulok…"

As she connected each of the four to each other, she worked through the correct grammar and arithmatic to make sure they would work. She double checked the facts and the math, and each of them connected perfectly. Then she stared. Because there was Ulok, but when she placed her pencil down to connect Ulok… she stared in dismay at Ehwaz.

She put a hand to her mouth, horrified. "Their second natures don't go together."

"Hey, Hermione. Take it easy. When I started out, I couldn't even figure out what to connect the first one with." Bill reassured.

Hermione thought about it-why it didn't work. Ehwaz's second nature was water, which couldn't go with Ulok's fire. They would self-destruct. But every step had been perfect! Until then. "This is impossible." Hermione said. "I did everything perfectly! Just that last connection. Ehwaz is supposed to be really easy to connect!"

Bill nodded. "As long as it doesn't connect with fire at all. You're doing great, Hermione."

She banged her head on the table. "Yeah, but making a pentagon should be simple." She looked up from her sprawled position at Bill. His mohawk and fang earring was softened by the warm light of the kitchen fire, his leather jacket abandoned not carelessly, but _cooly_ , on the back of his wooden chair, the sleeves of his cool shirt rolled up to his elbows.

"Here." He said, gently brushing a few stray curly brown strands from the paper. Hermione watched from her position with half her face on the desk, too tired to even try and move. "If we replace Ehwaz with Jin," He used the back of the pencil (she'd insisted on it after they'd used up the twelf sheet of paper with their quill-ink)

"But it has a 4.7 power level and would upset the triangular stability constant." Hermione mumbled into the table.

Bill gave her a brilliant smile, as if she had just uttered an earth shattering declaration. "So we just need to change on of the two runes opposite it so the they will match it's stability constant…"

"We change Ulok?"

"Close."

"Ooosh. I mean Oush." Hermione corrected hastily. There were only two things that would change.

Another smile. "Annndddd?"

"We can use.." Hermione sat up, staring at the suiggles. Then as her brain suggested possibilities she would go over the math, the properties, the elements. "Ahhh, my head hurts." She cried.

Bill just looked amused. "You can do it."

"This is so complicated! You have to have each rune beside it match elemental characteristics, then you have to have each rune in the sequence so the magic will flow one way, then the ones across from it have to add together to balance it out, and you can't have a powerrful beside a small, a small beside a crooked, or a circle beside a square, the constants to be perfect prime numbers, and then you want the total to be Merlin's number?" She was red by the time she was done her rant.

"Hermione, you're approaching it all wrong."

She stuck out her chin in difiance. "Oh yeah?"

Bill took the pencil from her hand, really, he would be a great teacher if he didn't make a living breaking wards around ancient tombs in Egypt. "You're trying to think linear. In a straight line. Logical. Like if you use Ehwaz, you will use this… ect. You need to let go. Just let your ideas go and see where they take you. It's like…"

"You can't keep thinking of the rules." Fred interrupted from living room, where he was playing a game of exploding snap with George and Ginny.

"Think of the possibilities." George added helpfully. "It's kind of like when we're inventing. Isn't it, Feorge?"

"The possibilities hurt my head." Hermione whined, all too well aware that she was being a baby. She sat up, new determination in her eyes. "Sorry. Ok. Bill, let's do this."

Four hours later, Hermione still hadn't completed the simplest pentagon.

"Let's take a break." Bill suggested.

Hermione shook her head. But she was to tired to argue. "Thanks for teaching me." She mumbled.

He shrugged. "It's what I do. Least of what I could do after what you've been through. The three of you, I mean."

The boys had played one round of chess, looked at the papers scattered around Bill and Hermione with horror, and gone off to bed. Harry had given her an encouraging smile before yawning widely and following the swiftly retreating Ron. She couldn't quell the feeling of gratitude she felt towards Harry. He was actually so considerate, for someone who had been through so much. People always assumed it was Hermione that took care of Harry. But it was frequently the other way around. Ron was just... Ron. "Yeah. No one should have gone through what Harry went through."

Everyone grew solemn as they contemplated. Harry had returned last year bloodied and shaking of cruciatus from another close bout with the Dark Lord. "Yeah. Well, we've got more cleaning tomorrow. Let's call it a night."

A sleepy Ginny followed her up the stairs to their room. "Warding was that fun, huh?"

"If by fun, you mean incredibly frustrating, then yeah."

Ginny snorted.

They lay in comfortable silence for a few moments, then, "You excited for school to start?" Hermione asked.

Ginny was silent for a few moments. "Yeah." She said, sounding surprised herself. "I mean, this summer has been pretty nerve wracking. We all know You-Know-Who is out there, and our families are actively fighting against him, but they aren't letting us know _anything._ "

It was Hermione's turn to grunt.

"You excited?"

"Still have to go, don't I?"

"Come on, Hermione. You're the best student in your entire year, if not all of Hogwarts."

Hermione blushed. "I'm worried about OWLs."

"Oh." Ginny said. But she didn't dismiss them, like she knew Ron or Harry would. Hermione was smart enough to realize she would probably do well, there wasn't anything arrogant about it, it was fact. But she was still worried.

"Goodnight, Ginny."

"Night, Hermione."

\- Only A Girl -

Reviews will be cherished forever.


End file.
